Never Too Late
by DeadlyMarionette
Summary: It's simple to end it all when there seems to be no other way out, but is it truly too late? Temari centric. ShikaxTema friendship


Alright, this is a ShikaxTema fic, but more friendship then anything else. I guess you can interpret it as romance, but there is no kissing or hugging or the words 'I love you', and I think of it as friends or _slight_ romance only.

Also, let me warn you, there is attempted suicide, murder, gore, and disturbing writing in this fic. I'm warning you. If you don't like it, don't read. I think it qualifies for the T rating, but if you believe it should be raised, please tell me and I will do so.

**Disclaimer**: I do not own Temari, Gaara, Kankuro, or Shikamaru. Masashi Kishimoto does.

XxXxXxXxXxX

It was easy.

So many possibilities, all so simple. A simple matter, to slit ones throat, to tie a noose around you neck, and jump off a cliff. All so simple.

Yet they are not simple, not in the slightest. To slit ones throat would leave blood. Would cause pain. Would leave time to think.

Too tie a noose or to jump would take time. Time to think.

And she was done with thinking. She'd had too much time to think. Fourteen years too long, in fact. Temari was sick of thinking. Sick of her _life_.

She'd always thought suicide was pointless. It was just a way to escape if you were too weak to continue. She was anything but _weak._ Temari was not a wimp. She'd never thought that she'd end her life. Never.

And yet here she stood, kunai in hand, standing atop a two-story building, doing the unthinkable. Why, why was she doing this? This stupid, pathetic, pointless thing?

Life.

It was too late for her. Far too late. Kankuro, her brother, her only living relative, was gone. No, not _gone_, killed. _Murdered_. And by none other than her other brother, Gaara.

Not that she could really think of him as her brother any more. No, not anymore. Maybe for a short while she did, after the Kyuubi incident. But that was past. Gaara had lost it. He was _gone_. No, perhaps he was murdered as well. Murdered by cruel words, attempted assassinations, isolation, and Shukaku. Murdered on the inside. However it happened, he was gone.

And he made sure that everyone knew it.

Kankuro... there were no words for what happened to him. Disembodied didn't fit. Destroyed hardly made a slit. Mauled wasn't even close.

No, what happened to him before her eyes was much, much worse. Temari now knew that every other kill—every _single_ kill—that Gaara had previously done, were nothing but practice. Nothing but practice for a baby. He _toyed_ with them. He was kind to them. Adding all of those deaths together didn't compare.

Alright, perhaps Temari was exaggerating. No death could be _that_ bad, but it was still horrible.

In front of her eyes, while she had been pinned against a wall, bleeding and sobbing, Kankuro had been ripped apart. It wasn't even by the sand, or Shukaku's hands, but by _Gaara's_ hands. Their little _brothers'_ hands. Limb by limb, he was ripped apart, screaming. Sand tearing at his skin, tearing until it reached bone, and going on…

It had taken hours, and he had screamed bloody murder throughout the whole torture. And all the while Temari had screamed and sobbed. She had clawed at Gaara, clung to him, screaming at the top of her lungs, _pleading_ for him_—_for her little brother_—_to stop. But he never did, never even acknowledged her until Kankuro was no more. Just a bloody, sandy mess of a corpse.

"_STOP!" _she suddenly screamed, cutting short her nightmarish daydreamclutching her head and dropping to her knees.

"STOP, STOP, _STOP_! Shut up!" she continued to screamed, tears bubbling up in the corners of her eyes, tracing their path down her cheeks before meeting their demise on the sandy floor where she stood.

She couldn't think like this! She had chosen to kill herself to stop it. The horrible nightmares that woke her up screaming and crying, with scratches on her face and arms. Scratches caused by _herself_.

She had chosen to slit her throat and wrists before jumping so that she would die, and so that all would know. Know that her family was all _dead_.

But if she didn't do it now, she never could. She didn't _want_ to die. She didn't, not at all. Even those horrible nightmares weren't enough to drive her to this.

No, only Gaara's words to her were.

"…_Stop_…" she pleaded, but her brain refused to listen, and she found herself recalling those horrible, twisted words that her brother—no, not her brother, that _monster_—had said to her.

She remembered it all clearly, far too clearly. His twisted promise to her as he looked at her with that horrid grin…

XxXxXxXxXxX

"_Gaara! Gaara, please, please stop! Stop! STOP! STOP!" Temari cried out, her voice a hoarse sob. She'd been screaming non-stop for hours, pounding and clawing at her brother—no, that thing had once been her bother, she refused to call that thing her brother—and she could hardly move any longer._

_Yet she kept at it, unaware through her tear and blood filled vision that her brother was now dead, and the _thing_ was now looking at her._

"_Stop what, dear sister?" came the inhuman, hissing voice that broke through Temari's sobs. She gasped, made a choking sound, and looked up at the figure standing above her fallen body._

_It took her a moment to find her voice. How could he _say _ that? After he had just _destroyed_ his own brother!_

"_Stop hurting him! Don't _kill_ him!" she screamed back in response. She could hardly see him, her eyes so clouded with tears, but she could hear him perfectly. _

_A chuckle followed her words, which soon turned into a laugh. An insane, inhuman laugh that sent chills through her body, shaking her to the bone._

"_But, my dear sister, that wouldn't be nearly as much _fun_," the thing that had once been Gaara whispered, a chuckle still evident in its voice. _

"_FUN? You call this FUN?" she choked out, astonished and appalled. Perhaps she'd already guessed that, but it was still a disgusting admittance._

"_Yes," came the single word reply, followed by another round of insane laughter. Temari stared in shock for a minute, before kneeling over and throwing up, an action that only caused more laughter to erupt from the monster._

"_Gaara, please, stop, don't kill Kankuro," she pleaded, but inside knew that it was too late. Gaara was gone, and even before it spoke, she knew Kankuro was as well._

"_Do not kill him? But he is already dead," came the delighted reply, and with a gagging sound, Temari forced herself to look. _

_Even through her tear-filled eyes, she saw the damage. Blood splattered on the wall, the metallic odor just know reaching her senses, and to her right, the bloody mass that had once been her brother. If it could be called that. Now, It was just an unrecognizable mass of deformed flesh and shattered bone._

_She clutched her stomach, a scream erupting from her throat, before she threw up again. She could only scream when she heard the laughter that erupted around her, enveloping her whole being._

"_Now, dear sister, are you ready to play? Ready to be _killed_? I could give you the same fate as your brother over there, but somehow that doesn't seem as fun. Perhaps a different game? Yes…I know! You love this village, do you not? And you love life? Perhaps I can get you to change you mind? Yes! Would you like to see every other pathetic person in this village murdered like your brother? Yes! But don't worry, it won't be forever. Only until you die. I want to have the pleasure of killing you when you no longer love life," the thing cackled, leaning down so that it was whispering in her ear. She smelled blood in his mouth, felt the red liquid that covered him dripping onto her, and could only clutch her face._

"…_N-no…" she choked out, but it only smirked._

"_Yes, dearest sister. I shall kill you when you no longer love life. I want to see your face as this game goes on, as every person falls to the ground, all blaming _you_. Yes, doesn't that sound fun?" It whispered, the menacing, bloody grin widening._

_She couldn't even respond. She had no tears left, she couldn't throw up, so she just made a gagging sound and fell to her side, gasping._

_It leaned down over her, and she squeezed her eyes shut tight. The smell of blood was overpowering, and the hissing breath of the monster blocked out all other sound. But the worst sensation was as it traced its hand over her face delicately, and brought its face close to hers._

"_Yes, tomorrow, lets play," It whispered, and before she knew what was happening, It pressed its lips onto hers, blood filling her mouth._

_Another scream erupted from her throat, muted by Its lips, before she finally passed out, welcoming the darkness._

XxXxXxXxXxX

Sobbing gasps escaped her mouth as she tore her eyes open, clutching her chest. Had she fallen asleep? She didn't know, but the memories were still fresh in her mind. Whatever had happened, she had remembered.

She had to do this _now_, before it found her. She'd already let too many die. She'd watched far too many of her friends and comrades fall before her since the incident. She'd seen horrors that no human eye should ever see. Sights that she'd _die_ to forget.

But that wasn't the reason that she was killing herself. At least, not the _whole _reason. She was a selfish, spoiled child, and she was partly doing this to escape the horrors and pain. But she also just wanted all the murders to _stop_.

But the true reason was that she didn't want to give _It_ the pleasure of completing its game and killing her. Perhaps that was selfish and pathetic, but she didn't care. It was the last thing that she could do. If she never let It kill her, then she would have won a small battle, however pointless, and even if it was only against herself.

"Do it already," Temari hissed to herself, and with a long, shaking breath, pulled herself up.

She was standing atop a building on the far side of her city. She wanted It to find her after she had died, to discover that It had lost. So she had come here at night, on top of a second story building, with a kunai in hand, ready to stop thinking and living.

With a trembling hand, she grasped the kunai tightly and lifted it up. She closed her eyes, stretched her forearms out, and brought the knife down.

She gasped sharply as the pain shot through her arm, tracing a red line from her elbow to wrist, but hesitated only a moment before doing the same to the other arm.

Finally, with shaking, bloody hands, she traced a deep line across her neck. Blood freely dripping down her arms and chest, she lost her grip on the kunai and let it slide from her fingers. She took one last deep breath, closed her eyes, and tumbled head-first over the side of the building.

She was prepared to hit the ground, to hear a sickening crack before it all faded away, but she was not prepared to feel arms wrap around her.

"So you actually jumped. How bothersome," came a familiar voice. It was gentle yet annoyed, but it took Temari a moment to recognize it. The leaf-nin that she had fought and later saved. What was his name? Oh yeah…Shikamaru.

She forced her eyes open, and found herself staring at the ground only a few feet below her. She felt dizzy and weak, but forced herself to speak.

"…W-why'd…y-you sa-save…m-me…?" she asked weakly, but didn't get an immediate response. Instead, she felt herself flipped over gently and placed on the ground until she was staring up and the worried face of the mane that had saved her.

"Why wouldn't I have? I don't like the idea of anyone killing themselves," he responded quietly after awhile, looking unsure of his response.

"…I-it's…t-too…l-la-late…" she replied in a strained voice, now aware that she was covered in blood. She had truly cut herself to kill.

"For what? To save everyone?"

A nod.

"Oh, that's what this is about? I see… I was sent here on a mission, because we heard that there was a massive amount of murders being committed here. It was just by chance that I heard you screaming.." Shikamaru murmured. "We're here to stop the murders."

"…T-too…l-late…" Temari whispered again. Her strength was diminishing quickly.

"No, we can find out who's causing this and stop them. It's not too late," Shikamaru whispered comfortingly. She was unaware that he had her hand in his, and was wrapping up her arm in bandages to stop the bleeding.

She found herself becoming painfully angry at his ignorance, and somehow found the strength to yell—albeit extremely weakly—at him, "…GAARA! He…It…is m-murdering….e-everyone… Too…l-late to…s-stop It…."

His expression was that of surprise, and after a moment, of understanding. "…I understand now. Your brother…this is too much for you, isn't it?" he asked gently. Though Shikamaru was lazy and didn't truly like being a ninja, he was an extremely intelligent and kind person. He understood what Temari was feeling.

She nodded, her 'outburst' taking the last out of her. Darkness was creeping into the corners of her vision. Yet she couldn't stop herself from continuing.

"…I have…n-nothing…left…All...d-dead…It...w-wont stop…until…I-I'm…dead…" she choked out, her voice so faint that Shikamaru had to lean close to hear.

"..How bothersome… You think that you have nothing left? That you're all alone?" he asked in a sad tone, wrapping her other arm in bandages now. "Then what am I? A ghost? I guess I don't really count, do I?"

Temari stared at him, shocked. Only know was she aware that her wounds were all bandaged, and the bleeding stopped. He was helping her… This leaf ninja who she hardly knew…what was he saying?

"Do you not want my help? I'll leave you now, and we can let Gaara finish everyone off, if you really want that. I won't bother if you really think it's useless," he continued, but though his tone seemed bored, his eyes were glistening with tears, and his voice shook slightly.

"…I-it's…not…t-too…late…?" Temari asked him in a whisper, suddenly believing him. She wasn't alone. She had a friend, and a village who would help her. _It_ wouldn't win. "I-I…have…y-you…?"

A smile broke out across Shikamaru's face, and tears fell from his eyes. "Yes, you have me, Temari. Don't worry, it's never too late.

XxXxXxXxXxX

There you have it, my second fanfic All written in one sitting. O.o Um, yeah, that was pretty twisted and morbid, wasn't it? x.x I'm sorry… I wasn't planning on it…

If you see any grammar or spelling errors, please inform me Also inform me if you'd like anything clarified.

I wasn't sure how to write this. I don't particularly like suicide fics, and I know very little about the subject. But I tried my best. I'm sorry if the characters are out of character… I portrayed them as best as I could in this story.

Please tell me if the rating should be raised. Um, I suppose that's it. ;


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